


reach out (and touch)

by kimjongdae



Category: K-pop, VIXX
Genre: M/M, hyukbin, internet!au, kind of
Language: English
Status: Completed
Published: 2016-08-26
Updated: 2016-08-26
Packaged: 2018-08-11 04:46:52
Rating: Teen And Up Audiences
Warnings: No Archive Warnings Apply
Chapters: 1
Words: 2,795
Publisher: archiveofourown.org
Story URL: https://archiveofourown.org/works/7877149
Author URL: https://archiveofourown.org/users/kimjongdae/pseuds/kimjongdae
Summary: <blockquote class="userstuff">
              <p>sanghyuk meets hongbin through the internet.</p>
            </blockquote>





	reach out (and touch)

**Author's Note:**

> horribly unbeta-ed (forgive me)
> 
> !!! originally posted on lj

Sanghyuk is bored.

He’s lying on the center of his bed, fanning his face with one hand and scrolling through his Tumblr activity with the other. He is so, so bored, and the lack in amount of Cha Hakyeon’s presence isn’t really helping his situation. Hakyeon’s visiting his parents in Changwon for the week, and Sanghyuk’s certain hasn’t felt this lonely in a _long_ time.

 

**_jkrystali liked your post_ **

**_jkrystali reblogged your post_ **

**_tuanyien3 liked your post_**  

**_chenhunxo liked your post_ **

 

Something catches his eye sooner than he thinks, though, as he notes a couple of a user’s (cute) replies on his most recent photo post – otherwise known as a selca that he’d posted after being subject to Hakyeon’s adamant whining over one of their KakaoTalk chatrooms. It’s a bit blurry, but Sanghyuk recalls he took it when his family planned a camping trip and dragged him along (where he spent the majority of his time texting Hakyeon and consistently complaining over the littlest of things). His muddy brown hair’s a mess, but there’s something about the sparkle in his eyes that Hakyeon specifically likes about this photo – something that allowed him to dub it his favorite photo of Sanghyuk so far.

 

**_hhongbean said: why are you so pretty gdi_ **

**_hhongbean said: (ノಠ益ಠ)ノ_ **

 

Sanghyuk’s immediate response was his cheeks flushing a pale shade of pink, eyebrows furrowing as he struggled to type up a reply to the sender.

 

**_shyuk95 said: Omg no I’m not pls_ **

 

Surprisingly enough, a reply came within seconds. Sanghyuk’s eyes went wide as he straightened his back and refreshed the activity page, his head tilting to the side.

 

**_hhongbean asked: EXCUSE YOU_ **

 

Sanghyuk’s thoughts immediately fly towards Hakyeon, tiptoeing around his best friend in a way that has Sanghyuk admitting to himself how much he misses the elder. He doesn’t know why, but he finds himself replying at almost light’s speed, his fingers hovering above the keyboard as he considers something at the back of his head. His hand then also moves to click the button with the label _answer privately_.

 

**_shyuk95 answered: ……. I’m anything but pretty_ **

It’s because he _isn’t_ , he tells himself. He isn’t pretty and no one (Tumblr user hhongbean included) will be able to convince him otherwise.

And, rather unexpectedly, when he refreshes the page a minute later, his inbox doesn’t have one message waiting to be responded to – it has three.

 

**_hhongbean asked: are you kidding_ **

**_hhongbean asked: i mean you aren’t /kidding/ you’re hyuk_ **

**_hhongbean asked: but really_ **

 

Despite the fact that on any regular occasion Sanghyuk would have been irritated with the response, he finds himself smiling.

 

**_shyuk95 answered: No_ **

**_shyuk95 answered: Well actually my name is Han Sanghyuk_ **

**_shyuk95 answered: ,,.. I’m not pretty_ **

 

He sends the last one with his eyebrows furrowed. hhongbean’s response comes, yet again, in a matter of minutes.

 

**_hhongbean asked: …… i will not hesitate to throw you off the roof of a building_  **

**_hhongbean asked: you’re really fucking pretty shudup_  **

**_hhongbean asked: i’m lee hongbin!_ **

  

Sanghyun stares at the words ‘lee hongbin’ perhaps a little bit longer than necessary, even going as far as mumbling the name to test it on his tongue. _Lee Hongbin_. His hands fly to type something in answer to hhongbean’s last message (or, Hongbin, whatever), and he blinks a couple of times before moving the cursor over to send the response before he can convince himself otherwise.

 

**_shyuk95 answered: Do you want to add me on KKT?_ **

 

 

* * *

 

 

 

The thing (one of the many things, actually) that Sanghyuk finds admirable about Hakyeon is his ability to adapt. Where Sanghyuk’s life after spending eight hours in school every day mostly consists of either a couple of hours in the gym or at one of his dance club meetings, Hakyeon’s juggled three jobs at once. He’s gone from doing secretary work, to bussing tables at a restaurant, to babysitting, even walking the neighbor’s dogs, if asked to. He can sing and dance – Sanghyuk was almost convinced at one point that there wasn’t anything that Hakyeon _couldn’t_ do (which he sooner found out was false, because Hakyeon couldn’t cook to save his life).  

Hakyeon’s adaptable, and Sanghyuk mostly believes that it’s due to Hakyeon’s bizarre need for novelty – how everyday routine eventually bores Hakyeon, whether he likes it or not. Hakyeon also tends to drag Sanghyuk along to whatever job he’s managed to get himself into for the week, and that is how Sanghyuk finds himself in a booth at the local coffee shop, his notebooks scattered around the table with a cup of coffee sitting at the edge, almost untouched.

Sanghyuk remembers, while he’s aimlessly leafing through his Physics notes that he was in a similar position months before, when Hakyeon had gotten a job at the new Mexican restaurant a block down from his school, when he’d sat for a good three hours by himself, nibbling on a taco that he couldn’t remember ordering – this time, however, Hakyeon’s delivering coffee.

His phone buzzes, the screen lightening up from where its been laying down on the table for a few minutes, and Sanghyuk grabs it in almost an instant. It’s a KakaoTalk notification.

 

**_RedBeans93: jesus hyuk calm down_ **

**_RedBeans93: i was only away for a couple of days_ **

**_RedBeans93: (∗ᵕ̴᷄◡ᵕ̴᷅∗)_ **

 

A smile graces Sanghyuk’s features as he reads the messages over again, fingers automatically sliding over the screen to unlock the phone and being to type a response.

 

**_HSangHyuk: DO YOU EVEN REALIZE HOW MANY TIMES_ **

**_HSangHyuk: HAKYEON MADE ME WATCH_ **

**_HSangHyuk: THAT_ **

**_HSangHyuk: STUPID_ **

**_HSangHyuk: SNSD VIDEO_ **

**_HSangHyuk: I WAS SUFFERING_ **

**_HSangHyuk: I STILL AM_ **

 

Sanghyuk pulls his phone up in favor of taking a quick snap of the café, and managing to accidentally capture Hakyeon’s bent over butt in the process. He considers deleting it for a second, but then he remembers how Hakyeon had posted snaps of Sanghyuk trying his eldest sister’s make-up on and he decides against it, quickly moving to open the Tumblr app before he can talk himself out of it, and posting the picture, along with the caption ‘#chabooty’. Just as he’s about to set his phone back down and get back to (flipping through) his notes, he gets a new KakaoTalk notification.

 

** _RedBeans93: is that your own stupid way of sayign you missed me_ **

**_RedBeans93: because i missed you loads_ **

**_RedBeans93: (aLSO TELL HAKYEON I SAID HI)_ **

** _RedBeans93: (AND THAT HIS BUTT LOOKS GREAT TODAY)_ **

 

Sanghyun snorts and types down a quick message in response.

 

**_HSangHyuk: Yes I missed you_ **

**_HSangHyuk: And no I’m not telling him that_ **

**_HSangHyuk: Tell him yourself_ **

**_HSangHyuk: :)_ **

 

He gets an answer from Hongbin in seconds.

 

** _RedBeans93: AW BBY_ **

** _RedBeans93: I MISSDE YOU TOO]_ **

** _RedBeans93: hey hey i would honestly_ **

**_RedBeans93: but we’ve never been properly introduced_ **

 

And it’s true – Sanghyuk has never once introduced Hakyeon to Hongbin. It wasn’t for any particular reason, but he realized sooner rather than later that his friends were potentially embarrassing, and he didn’t want to scare Hongbin away just yet.

 

** _HSangHyuk: Good_ **

** _HSangHyuk: I’ll introduce you to him when the time is right_ **

** _HSangHyuk: (Which I’m hoping is never)_ **

 

When he doesn’t receive an immediate answer from Hongbin he sighs and sets the phone back down on the table. It only happens that seconds later, Hakyeon sets a cup of coffee down on the table (not on Sanghyuk’s notebooks, thank God) and slides into the seat across from where Sanghyuk’s own is. Sanghyuk promptly decides to pack his notebooks before Hakyeon does something stupid or spill anything on them, because _yes_ , that’s happened before.

“Who’re you texting?” Hakyeon asks right as Sanghyuk’s bending down to grab the backpack that he’d discarded when he’d originally sat down. “Is it that internet boyfriend of yours? Honggi or something?”  

Sanghyuk scrunched the tip of his nose up as he shoved the books into the bag and zipped it up nice and quick. “ _Hongbin_ is not my boyfriend.”

“Sanghyuk has a boyfriend?” A new voice joins in, popping up from behind where Sanghyuk is seated and Sanghyuk groans internally when he recognizes the voice as one belonging to the notorious Lee Jaehwan (who Sanghyuk assumed was the one who’d gotten Hakyeon his new job in the first place).

“What, you work here, too?” Sanghyuk asks when Jaehwan takes a couple of steps forwards and slides so that he’s seated right beside Hakyeon. Sanghyuk would be lying if he said he hadn’t seen Jaehwan since he graduated a couple of years ago (back when Sanghyuk’d been a gangly tenth year), because he had seen quite a lot of Jaehwan in the previous six months. Their neighborhood was a relatively small one when compared to others in the metropolitan area, so Sanghyuk occasionally did see old friends from high school around here and there, including Jaehwan. 

“I manage this place.” Jaehwan answered with a snort passing through his nostrils. Sanghyuk’s eyebrows furrow almost instantly, but before he can make a backhanded comment about how Jaehwan had been planning to become an idol singer, Jaehwan cuts him off. “What’s this I hear about a boyfriend?”

“He’s not my boyfriend.” Sanghyuk mumbles, tapping his fingers against the surface of the table in an odd-sounding rhythm. His phone chooses to buzz in that precise second, and Sanghyuk immediately curses at his horrible timing when Hakyeon makes a grab at it before anyone can even properly react. 

“Of course, he’s not.” Hakyeon chuckles, and Sanghyuk, instead of trying to snatch the phone back from Hakyeon (which he knows from the start is pretty much never going to work), buries his face in his hands and groans. He hears a loud laugh and the sound of muffled whispering from across the table and he directly decides to himself that, from then on, he’ll be avoiding Jaehwan’s shop like the plague.

“Chabooty?” Hakyeon releases a series of short laugh-slash-choking sounds, and Sanghyun internally groans once again.

“Aren’t you supposed to be working?” He asks, bringing his hands down to find Hakyeon and Jaehwan sitting side by side, eyes locked on Sanghyuk’s phone screen. 

“Lunch break.” Hakyeon responds, his smile perhaps a little too wide as he sets the phone down in front of Sanghyuk. Sanghyuk’s hands fly to the phone, his first destination being the Tumblr app that Hakyeon had left unclosed. He finds that his post captioned ‘#chabooty’ has already reached thirty notes. Right above _it_ and a couple of new Teen Wolf gifsets Sanghyuk finds a selca of Hakyeon pressing a kiss to Jaehwan’s cheek with the caption ‘no homo’ and he tries not to wince when he finds the post tagged ‘#but totally homo’ and ‘#HaKen’.

“Are you really going to keep calling yourselves that?” He mumbles, shutting the app and moving over to his next target, as Hakyeon mumbles something about HaKen being the next celebrity power couple and Sanghyuk tries his best to ignore that because Hakyeon and Jaehwan are nowhere near being celebrities, or a couple (at least, he doesn’t think so). 

What he finds in the KakaoTalk app, is five notifications from his chat with Hongbin and a new group chat. The group chat, he realizes, is comprised of him, Hongbin, Hakyeon (CHA_NNNNN), and Jaehwan (jaehwany0406), and was most probably created by Hakyeon himself. He decides against leaving the group, and skips over to the chat with Hongbin that has ( _thankfully_ ) been left untouched.

 

** _RedBeans93: why?????_ **

** _RedBeans93: am i too cool for your friends_ **

** _RedBeans93: i mean i know i’m pretty awesome but_ **

** _RedBeans93: IS THAT HIM IN THE NEW GROUP CHAT_ **

** _RedBeans93: OHM Y GOD IT IS_ **

** _RedBeans93: YOU ADDED JAEHWAN TOO,,,, OH GOD_ **

** _RedBeans93: WHAT DO I SAY_ **

 

Sanghyuk smiles and finds himself subtly shaking his head as he responds to Hongbin.

 

** _HSangHyuk: Just be yourself_ **

** _HSangHyuk: They’re practically in love with you already_ **

 

 

* * *

 

 

 

Sanghyuk regrets not leaving the group chat, and it’s not because Hakyeon and Jaehwan didn’t get along with Hongbin – _it’s the_ _complete_ _opposite_. He was probably right when he’d said that Hakyeon and Jaehwan were already in love with Hongbin, because they ended up, by the end of that week, talking to Hongbin almost every day, sometimes even more than Sanghyuk would.

In return, though, Hongbin introduces him to a couple of his friends, Taekwoon and Wonshik. Sanghyuk kind of feels jealous because it’s only after a while of awkwardly chatting with the two that he kind of warms up to them, whilst for Hongbin, it had only taken half a day.

It doesn’t mean he isn’t grateful, though, because it’s Taekwoon that suggests Hongbin and Sanghyuk make a video call one late Friday evening. Sanghyuk is initially surprised and besides a quick ‘lol sure why not’ he isn’t quite sure what to expect.

 

** _RedBeans93: WE COULD_ **

** _RedBeans93: BUT_ **

** _RedBeans93: ????????_ **

** _RedBeans93: CAN I HANDLE SEEING MY HYUKKIE LIVE_ **

** _RedBeans93: ?????////????????/_ **

** _RedBeans93: I’LL FAINT_ **

 

Sanghyuk’s smile grows when he notices the word ‘my’ sitting beside ‘Hyukkie’, which even if he finds the slightest bit embarrassing, he can’t help but like.

Video chatting with Hongbin – yeah, sure.

Why not?

 

 

* * *

 

 

 

“You know, sooner or later, I’m going to melt from this heat.”

Sanghyuk chuckles, gaze shifting from the text book he’d been quietly reading to the screen of his laptop, where the face of a very dejected-looking Lee Hongbin is centered, his hair (for the first time ever) looking much like a bird’s nest. Sanghyuk’s sitting underneath a pile of blankets, so it’s a bit of a struggle moving the webcam to point at the air conditioner, but he manages, somehow.

“I can’t sympathize.” He says, earning a loud groan from Hongbin as he rolls over and grabs his shirt by the hem, then lifts it off his chest in a swift movement. Sanghyuk tries not to stare at the horribly pixelated screen as he releases a chuckle and goes back to reading (or really, pretending to read) the words off the textbook. There’s something on his mind, and as much as he wants to, he can’t seem to get rid of it easily.

“You have your parents paying the electric bill.” Hongbin says, and Sanghyuk knows a little too well that if the words had come out of anyone else’s mouth he would have been, at the least, offended. Coming from Hongbin, though, he didn’t particularly mind.

He stays silent for a couple of seconds, blinking at the dull screen for a couple seconds before he speaks up again. “I’m graduating this week.”

Hongbin looks a bit surprised at the change of subject, but a grin breaks out on his features not long after. “That’s great, Hyukkie.”

Sanghyuk stares at his screen, unblinking. “Is it wrong to want to have you there?”

Hongbin stares at the screen as well, head slowly tilting to the side before he gave out a response. “No, of course not.”

Sanghyuk nods, lips tugging into a thin line because he’s just _not in the mood_ today.

“Hey, Hyukkie.” Hongbin says, and Sanghyuk looks up. “We’ll meet someday. I promise.”

“Really?” Sanghyuk asks, trying to fight down the twitching at the corners of his lips.

Hongbin nods, lifting a hand and running it through his hair. “Cross my heart.”

 

 

  

* * *

 

 

  ** _HSangHyuk: I love you_**

 

 

**_RedBeans93: i know :)_ **

**_RedBeans93: i love you too_ **

 

 

* * *

 

 

  

It’s nearly nine in the morning on the first day of July, and instead of sleeping in (much like he’d originally intended to), Sanghyuk is standing outside Seoul Station, fanning his face with a piece of cardboard and wondering to himself why he hadn’t waited in the car like any normal person.

The temperature doesn’t seem to be dropping any time soon, and Sanghyuk groans when he reminds himself that it’s _Hongbin_. He’s doing this for _Hongbin_.

His hair’s a mess of bleach blonde (he blames Hakyeon’s persuasiveness and his lack of self-control), and he’s in a plain white tee and a pair of basketball shorts, and not a lot of people seem to be paying him attention as he leans against the nearest wall and checks his watch every few minutes. He’d be lying if he says he isn’t nervous, because he _is_. He definitely is.

“Sanghyuk?”

Sanghyuk spins on his heel, eyes wide as he’s met with the eyes of someone he’s known far longer than he’d like to admit. He looks a lot more defined than he’d ever been on the screen of Sanghyuk’s laptop, and Sanghyuk notices that when he takes a step back and surveys the boy completely. He’s so much like Sanghyuk had imagined him to be, and yet, so different at the same time. 

“Hi.” He mumbles, taking a step forward and smiling as he tries to shake out that inexperienced nervousness.

“Hey.” Hongbin smiles back, and in that moment precisely, Sanghyuk feels just right.

 

 

 


End file.
